Thanks to lightweight composite materials and the increasing speed of wireless data networks, field technicians at Consolidated Communications are realizing benefits they never thought possible, such as having as short a commute to work as their work-at-home friends and solving more troubles each day.
Laptops aren’t new to field technicians, but they are harder, smarter and more mobile than ever before. And because of this they have become a dependable part of the technicians’ repertoire.
This wasn’t always the case. Technicians didn’t take kindly at first to the intrusion of updating trouble tickets and having new tickets sent to them in the field. “The first time we tried this 10 years ago, a lot of technicians had never even used a computer, so there was definitely some resistance,” said Kip Havard, staff manager at Consolidated. “But we get no resistance today. They rely on it like their other tools.”
What has changed? It’s not just technicians who have grown accustom to lugging around a laptop; companies such as General Dynamics and Sierra Wireless have continued to make products that are more hardy, faster and dependable.
There was a time technicians would break — or in some cases find ways to break — up to five laptops per day. Now, “we work closely with Sierra Wireless to understand their design and work that into our ruggedized system to make sure connectors are solid and will survive the environment,” said Patrick White, vice president of strategic marketing at General Dynamics.
White said his Itronix notebook has the smallest footprint and lightest weight in the fully ruggedized category.
Also, Sierra Wireless modems support both CDMA and GSM networks. Now that Consolidated has grown beyond its Illinois roots with the acquisition of properties in Texas and Pittsburg, Pa., it needs them both.
But the biggest change for Consolidated is the efficiency it gains through the speed, range and reliability of its laptops. Technicians start work the minute they turn the ignition in their trucks — which they take home. There are no more 30-minute rides to the garage to pick up trouble tickets only to ride 30 minutes back to service a customer down the street. Trouble tickets are delivered wirelessly.
There is no more passing a co-worker on the way to the street you just left because a new trouble ticket was generated. There’s no more wasting gas.
“Trouble tickets are distributed throughout the day as they come in and can be distributed geographically or on a workload basis,” Havard said.
This is important to all regions but particularly in Texas where the company’s three territories in that state are non-contiguous. Consolidated has 116 technicians, thus 116 laptops, give or take a few spares. Havard said his company went through a trial-and-error process before settling on General Dynamics. “We spent so much time, effort and energy maintaining non-ruggedized laptops, that going this route really made any difference in cost an easy one to manage,” he said.
The time to resolve problems also decreased for Consolidated. “It was dramatic. We cut out all the non-productive work and eliminated the middle man with trouble ticketing,” Havard said.
Consolidated’s next step would be GPS-enabling the laptops. However, that poses a new set of issues for technicians, issues to which they may not be receptive. “GPS is one of those things we’d love to do, but there are more people-type obstacles to overcome. So we have a ways to go there,” Havard said.
The biggest beneficiary of better workforce management tools may be the customer. Shorter trouble resolution times, more troubles fixed in a day, fewer truck rolls and efficient trouble ticketing are bound to improve the customer experience. Exactly how much is hard for Havard to say. “I would like to think that we don’t have significant enough problems that the customer would even notice,” he said.
